A little back-dated here. This is the day we moved into our own apt. Home sweet home.

We needed some help with the king-sized bed. The headboard and divan bottom could be dismantled, so that wasn't a problem, but the king-sized mattress posed a headache.

We enlisted the help of WK (Angeling's hubby) and VJ (my bil). So they first had to wrestle the mattress from the 2nd floor of my mil's house down to the ground floor. The staircase is very narrow, but they managed to do it. That's still not the toughest part.

I hired a covered lorry just to ferry the bed, some boxes and 2 bookcases to the flat. Very reasonable rate. As long as we moved everything ourselves, the rental of the lorry cost just $50.

When we reached our block, since my apt is way up high, if we can't fit the mattress in the elevator/ lift, that's it! Our poor hubbies would have to move that thingy up by the stairs!!

Fortunately, with a lot of noise (heaving, puffing, ranting), they managed to squeeze and fold and squish the mattress into the lift, and then hurl their 3 bodies into the same lift as well. It must have been really funny. I didn't witness, cos the kids were roped in to "jaga" (watch) the bookcases and headboard at the void deck, while I was stationed in the house with wide open doors to receive the mattress. It was Dh who related the account to me.

This pic shows the divan bottom with the hydraulic lift-up cover for additional storage within. That's VJ and Dh.

And the headboards. That's WK. Big thanks to the great manpower.

19 Dec

YST conservatory

Msian Youth Philharmonic Orch concert

Dh got complimentary tickets for our whole family and we went. Initially I was concerned that they wouldn't let ds2 enter because most venues allow kids 6 and above only.

But Dh says this is a youth concert, and YST is less strict than the Esplanade. So we tried.

Also, the concert's prog was mostly familiar favourites, like The Nutcracker Suite for the 2nd half. They even played many Xmas favourites as encore pieces.

We also had the pleasant surprise of meeting up with many friends. For me, I bumped into 2 NIE Bio classmates. Since it's my dearest old friend, I sat down to catch up with her while Dh, who also met his friends, brought the boys along with him and they went for their chat.

And then ds1 met his piano class friend. Actually, what his teacher does is, everytime there is a student scheduled before ds1, she'll make that student interact and play something for the next student. I find that very nice. First, it allows the earlier student to have more little performing opportunities, and then it motivates the next student to want to reach that level to enjoy playing that piece too.

So far, ds1 told me about this boy who played The Pink Panther for him before, and this girl who we met at the concert, who played a very nice piece for him, but he can't remember the title. I can see ds1 enjoying his piano lessons a lot, thanks to this teacher. Well, she's Dh's friend, so I guess this kind of recommendation will never go wrong.

When I taught piano last time, I couldn't afford to give presents each lesson. I did give stickers as rewards. But so far ds1 has received M&M packets, soft toy, nougat, Mamee noodle snack and other chocs as rewards! Of course those motivate him a lot too. :-) And then, he also loves the piano teacher's cat, so he always looks forward to playing with her cat.

I guess this should last longer than I expect, and that's good...

rainbows every day, do not worry for the morrow ____________________________________________________________